School in sell-off fight with neighbours

A TOP grammar school is at loggerheads with neighbours over plans to sell one of playing fields to property developers. Altrincham Grammar School for Boys - one of the highest performing schools in the region - has struck a deal with Crosby Homes.

A TOP grammar school is at loggerheads with neighbours over its plans to sell one of its playing fields to property developers.

Altrincham Grammar School for Boys - which is one of the highest performing schools in the region - has struck a deal with Crosby Homes to sell part of its playing fields for a housing development.

Selling the top football pitch which borders the railway line would allow the school to raise £1m to build a state-of-the-art sports hall.

For decades the school has resisted the option of selling off any of its 16 acres of prime land, but governors have finally given in because they need to replace a crumbling gym and drain waterlogged sports pitches.

The school - which Stone Roses star Ian Brown and Eidos magnate Ian Livingstone attended - is pressing the Department for Education and Skills to approve the scheme and hopes Trafford Council will grant planning permission.

If successful, the school would benefit from a hall with four badminton courts, two basketball courts, two tennis courts, cricket nets, a reception, full disabled access and a viewing gallery.

In recent years, boys at the heavily oversubscribed school have enjoyed state-of-the-art computer equipment, a new canteen, language centre and sixth form centre. The proposed sports hall would complete the modernisation programme.

Campaign

Headmaster Tim Gartside said: "This is a last ditch attempt for the school to raise the funds necessary for this project. Trafford council said if they funded it they couldn't give us any more money for 10 years. We have already got very strong teams against all the odds but this would mean the school would really be able to excel in sport."

But despite promises that the community will be invited to use the new facilities, the school's neighbours in Hale and Bowdon oppose any more development in the sought-after commuter area.

Anti-development campaigner Sally Johnson, 38, has a personal interest in stopping the new development because it would overlook her Cecil Road home - and she has also protested against three other new developments in the area.

She and her campaign team plan to lobby Graham Brady, MP for Altrincham and Sale West, and have circulated a petition in Hale.

She said: "This is not a case of `not in my back yard'. We want the boys to have the sports hall and we've offered to help them raise funds - but they've taken the easy option. There's been an enormous amount of mass development over the past few years and we just feel the Hale area is becoming eroded."

Headteacher Tim Gartside said in response: "It will be of massive benefit to an excellent school and to the community. I would say we have a very good case."